Certain laboratory procedures remain predominantly carried out using inefficient manual methods which require individual attention by the scientist or lab technician performing the procedure. Many of these procedures would benefit from automation. For example, nucleic acid purification, such as plasmid preparation is currently a time consuming, inefficient task that has not yet been automated. Gradual improvements such as the introduction of precipitation filters have reduced the hands-on time required, however even the most advanced nucleic acid purification kits still require several hours and individual attention. Similarly, processing for western blot analysis can be a labor intensive process that requires the scientist or lab technician to be tied to the bench during the process. In addition, such processes suffer from human error and lack of reproducibility inherent in manually intensive procedures. What is needed, and what is provided herein, in part, is a small, affordable, user-friendly and flexible instrument for reactions performed on solid supports, preproteomics sample preparation, nucleic acid applications, and cell separation applications with increased convenience of use, reduced labor time, decreased error, and increased reproducibility.